How we rescued Osun Speaker’s wife

AC Soji Ganzallo, Head of Department, Public Relations arm of the Vigilante Service of Ogun State, explains the mode of operation of the security group to Assistant Editor, JOKE KUJENYA. He explains how some members of the group stumbled on the abducted wife of the Speaker of Osun State House of Assembly, Mrs. Muibat Salaam, where she was kept on Saturday October 13, 2012 before his men secured her release.

Tell us about the Vigilance Service of Ogun State (VSoOS)

We are a security outfit that had been in operation since 1985 as the Vigilante Group of Nigeria until August 2011 when the state government took over. We were then restructured and given due recognition to assist our people by working with existing security authorities to secure their lives and property. We are basically set up to complement the effort of the Nigeria Police within our scope of operation. We are a grassroots security agency with our men spread across the remote communities of the state in order to fish out criminal tendencies, among others, so we can curb them before things get out of hand.

We also have men and women of our group within the towns offering uncompromising security services. And the larger percentage of our officials, both men and women, are indigenes of the areas where they operate in the state so that they will be able to access the locations of crimes without much stress. As a result, we know our people so well and even some of their names and home addresses. This has been helpful to our operations.

They all go to different parts of the state and environs to seek information and then report back to us. They mix with people. But they don’t carry arms about unless we are told that there is a situation somewhere requiring that they do so.

And you cannot easily know them because our investigators don’t wear uniforms. They relate and mingle with people freely. You won’t know that they are gathering information. It is only the regular officers that you would see in uniforms. We operate more like the olden days’ Civil Investigators’ Division (CID). And we are in all the states of the federation.

How did your men come across the Osun State Speaker’s wife?

On that day, our men were on duty in various places. Our men on duty said as they were on patrol, they received a call from another of their colleagues who was not with them at that location. The young man called the vigilance men and told them that his dad, the old man who sighted the woman and the men in the bush, had called him to report that he saw a criminal gang in the bush. So, he swung into action and that was how our men responded and caught up with them.

On that fateful day, the old man, it was said, was on his way to his farm at Ogunmakin area in Ogun State here. But for some reasons, the man decided to pass through another route to his farm. As he was going, he sighted the woman trying to squeeze her wet clothes apparently after she was beaten by rain. Quickly, he placed a call to his son, who happened to be a member of the vigilante group and told him all that he had seen. He even told him that he saw that they were with arms in the bush with a female member.

On hearing that, the boy called the team and our men in turn made a call to our office to request for reinforcement. We immediately instructed them to first of all surround the Ajebo area along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, not far from Abeokuta, with our men who were already on ground so that the criminals would not be able to escape. Then we quickly told the vigilance group on duty in Abeokuta to go and join the men in Ajebo to apprehend the criminals. That was how they pounced on the men and arrested four of them. Three escaped while one of them got killed in the imbroglio.

At what point did you realise that the victim was Osun State Speaker’s wife?

It was during the encounter that the woman was shouting not to be killed that she was not a thief but a victim of kidnapping. Her lamentations then aroused curiousity from our men and they guided her to the roadside where policemen eventually met them and her real identity was disclosed. It was after we had actually got her into safety from the hands of the bandits that we were able to know that she was the wife of the Speaker of the State of Osun.

Again, our men said they had earlier thought she was the female member of the gang and had pointed their gun at her. And you know that there are many criminal gangs with women leaders or members. Her vehement shout saved her. Thereafter, we involved the police as we were duty-bound to do. Later, all of them were taken to the Police Station at Eleweran in Abeokuta here.

From that point, the Oyo State Speaker was told and he informed his Osun counterpart who happened to be the woman’s husband. It was after the preliminary investigation and the handing over of the culprits that the Ogun State Police Commissioner released the woman to the Osun State CP and the Speaker himself also came down to the police station to take his wife back home.

As a way of following-up on the case, we made our presentation to the state police and submitted the files containing all the information we were able to gather on the gang. The four suspects arrested are now with the Osun State Police Command. The command is expected to continue the due process.

Are you hopeful that justice will be done to them?

But one of the problems we often encounter with this kind of case is that they do not confess even to the point of death. However, because these ones were caught with their victim still very much alive, they can be prosecuted without much time being wasted on them.

has been helpful to our operations.
They all go to different parts of the state and environs to seek information and then report back to us. They mix with people. But they don’t carry arms about unless we are told that there is a situation somewhere requiring that they do so.
And you cannot easily know them because our investigators don’t wear uniforms. They relate and mingle with people freely. You won’t know that they are gathering information. It is only the regular officers that you would see in uniforms. We operate more like the olden days’ Civil Investigators’ Division (CID). And we are in all the states of the federation.
How did your men come across the Osun State Speaker’s wife?
On that day, our men were on duty in various places. Our men on duty said as they were on patrol, they received a call from another of their colleagues who was not with them at that location. The young man called the vigilance men and told them that his dad, the old man who sighted the woman and the men in the bush, had called him to report that he saw a criminal gang in the bush. So, he swung into action and that was how our men responded and caught up with them.
On that fateful day, the old man, it was said, was on his way to his farm at Ogunmakin area in Ogun State here. But for some reasons, the man decided to pass through another route to his farm. As he was going, he sighted the woman trying to squeeze her wet clothes apparently after she was beaten by rain. Quickly, he placed a call to his son, who happened to be a member of the vigilante group and told him all that he had seen. He even told him that he saw that they were with arms in the bush with a female member.
On hearing that, the boy called the team and our men in turn made a call to our office to request for reinforcement. We immediately instructed them to first of all surround the Ajebo area along the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, not far from Abeokuta, with our men who were already on ground so that the criminals would not be able to escape. Then we quickly told the vigilance group on duty in Abeokuta to go and join the men in Ajebo to apprehend the criminals. That was how they pounced on the men and arrested four of them. Three escaped while one of them got killed in the imbroglio.
At what point did you realise that the victim was Osun State Speaker’s wife?
It was during the encounter that the woman was shouting not to be killed that she was not a thief but a victim of kidnapping. Her lamentations then aroused curiousity from our men and they guided her to the roadside where policemen eventually met them and her real identity was disclosed. It was after we had actually got her into safety from the hands of the bandits that we were able to know that she was the wife of the Speaker of the State of Osun.
Again, our men said they had earlier thought she was the female member of the gang and had pointed their gun at her. And you know that there are many criminal gangs with women leaders or members. Her vehement shout saved her. Thereafter, we involved the police as we were duty-bound to do. Later, all of them were taken to the Police Station at Eleweran in Abeokuta here.
From that point, the Oyo State Speaker was told and he informed his Osun counterpart who happened to be the woman’s husband. It was after the preliminary investigation and the handing over of the culprits that the Ogun State Police Commissioner released the woman to the Osun State CP and the Speaker himself also came down to the police station to take his wife back home.
As a way of following-up on the case, we made our presentation to the state police and submitted the files containing all the information we were able to gather on the gang. The four suspects arrested are now with the Osun State Police Command. The command is expected to continue the due process.
Are you hopeful that justice will be done to them?
But one of the problems we often encounter with this kind of case is that they do not confess even to the point of death. However, because these ones were caught with their victim still very much alive, they can be prosecuted without much time being wasted on them.